And This Will Be Untitled
by Lady Anatui
Summary: JL. In Muggle Studies, the students must write poems based off famous Muggle writers and recite them anonymously. When a certain poem catches Lily’s eye, she wants to find out who wrote it, but she’s having a bit of trouble.


_Disclaimer: The only thing I own is the poem, which I don't even really like anymore._

* * *

_And This Will Be Untitled…_

_How can words explain the way a person feels?  
__How can they even hope to state the emotions truthfully?  
__This world is just a bit scary  
__There are so many words  
__But they're all being used up on things unworthy  
__How could I call you a word that others use for a brand-new broomstick?  
__How could I possibly call you that?  
__I'm afraid to use the words  
__Because, every time I do, something just seems to go wrong  
__The words I use just aren't good enough for you  
__And I'm at a loss for ones that are  
__Until then, I just hope you can forgive me  
__Even these words here are unworthy  
__I may think and think  
__But, despite that, I just can't seem to find any ones that fit  
__You're too perfect for words  
__Even 'perfect' isn't good enough  
__And so this will remain untitled  
__Because no word could describe this  
__No words written would do  
__If I could write a beautiful poem, it would be for you  
__But that poem is unwritten  
__How could words describe my feelings for you?  
__How could they even hope to try?_

The poem had been brilliant, even if the author of said poem didn't agree. Lily had immediately loved it. It had so very much caught her attention. She simply adored it.

It was a Ravenclaw named Madison Fletcher that had read it, but their poems had been picked up and passed out by the teacher so that each student had an anonymous one. Neither Lily nor Madison knew who had written it.

Lily was already plotting how to figure that out, though, because she really wanted to know who could write so beautifully. And, one she had done that, she wanted to know who the person was talking about. Who was so perfect that no words could describe them? She was very intrigued by the mystery.

Normally, she wasn't so nosy, but the poem had caught her attention so. There was just something about it that made her want to know who had written it. Even if the poetry of the words was not beautiful, the thoughts behind it were.

The class was dismissed, but Lily lingered behind a moment. Her friend, Emmeline Vance, waited for her impatiently by the door. "Come on, Lil!" she called.

"I'm coming! Goodness, Emm, hold your horses!" Lily said with a sigh as she crammed her unused book into her bag.

As she and Emm made their way out of the classroom and toward the Great Hall for lunch, Lily was already trying to figure out how she could discover the writer of the poem. She knew that Professor Humphreys would never just tell her, but there had to be some paper in the Professor's room that told who had written each poem. But if she looked for the paper and found it, would that be considered stealing? Or just trespassing? Perhaps both. She didn't know, but the thought scared her. She didn't like to even think about breaking rules—that was something the damned Marauders did.

Nevertheless, Lily found herself sneaking into Professor Humphreys's dark office the next night, being as silent as she could. She had never broken a rule before in her entire life, and yet here she was breaking into a teacher's room. There was no turning back. And she suddenly felt sick because of it.

As she neared the desk, she heard voices from the door she had left open but a crack. She jumped and tried to hide beneath it in case the people were going to enter the room and light the candles.

"Thank you for the help, Minerva," came the voice of Professor Humphreys.

"Nonsense," replied McGonagall. "Those boys are just trouble. I must thank you for catching them, though."

"You can handle them, can't you? You don't need help?"

"They're just boys. Potter and Black were just setting a prank on the Slytherins. It's nothing new."

"I do apologize. This is my first year here, after all."

"Well, Allen, I'll do anything to help you settle in. Good night, then."

"Good night, Minerva," he said, and he entered the room, not noticing that the door had been partially open.

Lily hesitated beneath the desk as several candles were lit with Humphreys's wand. She couldn't turn back now. She was stuck there until he was to leave.

Humphreys never sat down at his desk, and that was a great relief. But he didn't leave his office for quite a while. While she waited, she carefully pulled loose papers off his desk, attempting to see if any of them were their last project. None of them were.

When she was finally able to leave, it was almost an hour since his arrival. She escaped into the dark corridors without trying to find the poem's author anymore. She was too afraid that he would be back.

As she made her way back toward the Gryffindor tower as quietly as possible, she ran into two troublemakers coming out of McGonagall's office. She sent them both disapproving glances before taking up her Head Girl posture and moving on ahead of them.

"Don't act like you're not up to no good," Sirius called after her.

She stopped in her tracks and turned back to him. "What is that supposed to mean, Black?" she snapped.

"There are already prefects patrolling the corridors, so there's no reason for you to be here," James reminded her with a raised eyebrow.

"I do have duties that aren't your business," she responded, and she turned to continue toward the tower.

Both boys followed her and spoke in hushed voices, barely taunting her but never loud enough for her to hear them. After what appeared to be a small argument, Sirius succumbed and yelled at her.

"Oi, Evans!" he cried in frustration.

"What now?" she snapped, glancing back at them with utter contempt. "There are more important things in my life than you two."

Sirius rolled his eyes at that. "Like I give a damn, Evans."

"What do you want already?"

"In Muggle Studies today, what was your favorite poem?" he asked.

She easily caught on, realizing that the argument that had just occurred was James telling his friend to ask her that question. "Not Potter's," she snapped.

"How do you even know what poem I wrote?" inquired the Head Boy indignantly.

"Oh please! With that brain of yours, you probably wrote the one about how daffodils are so yellow," she said, rolling her eyes.

The two boys snickered. "No," Sirius said a moment later, "Peter wrote that one."

She shrugged, not caring. "Close enough."

When they reached the Fat Lady's portrait, Lily said the password and entered the common room, the two not far behind her. With a sigh of relaxation and relief of returning without trouble, she moved to her school books, which she had left out to be as inconspicuous as possible. If she had put away her books in the dormitory and then not gone to bed, Emm would have noticed.

"You coming to bed?" Sirius asked his best friend.

"In a minute. You go on."

"It won't work," and Sirius ascended the staircase to the seventh year boys' dormitory, quietly closing the door behind him.

As Lily packed away her books and parchment and quills and ink, she heard the footsteps of someone approaching her. Without looking up, she snapped, "Go away, Potter. I'm not in the mood to talk to you."

The movement stopped in front of the table, and she glanced up to see him standing there. "Er, Evans," he began.

"Go to bed," she said, glaring at him, before turning back to her packing as if he weren't there. When everything was in her bag a second later, she swung it over her shoulder and turned to go up her own staircase.

"Wait! Evans!" he called after her, reaching out his hand to stop her, but she evaded him.

When the door closed behind her, he was still standing at the foot of the staircase as if waiting for her to return.

Lily could barely sleep that night, and she woke in the morning to her best friend jumping on her bed and yelling at her. She shrieked at Emm and hit her with her pillow, knocking the other girl off her bed. "Don't wake me up like that!" she cried angrily. "And what are you doing up so early?"

"Lily, we're going to be late," complained Emm, "and now you've wounded me." She rubbed her right hip as she got to her feet, and she stuck her tongue out at her friend.

"What do you mean by 'late'?" snapped Lily.

"You've slept through breakfast."

"I never sleep through breakfast!" she screamed in surprise and jumped out of bed in a rush to get ready.

"Why were you so tired?" asked Emm as she watched her hurrying around the room. "You didn't come into the dorm before I fell asleep. As late as you stay up to work on homework and read, you don't usually stay up _that_ late. I was worried about you."

"Oh, I just got distracted and lost track of time," she said in a nervous voice. She wasn't accustomed to lying, least of all to her best friend.

"Lily, you suck at lying, and you know it," Emm reminded her.

"I know I do. That's why I don't do it."

She rolled her eyes. "Okay, you can go on lying for the rest of the day, but you better tell me by midnight."

Lily smiled. "Thanks, Emm. There's still some stuff that I need to figure out before I tell anyone."

"Of course there is. Now come on."

"Didn't you bring me breakfast?"

"It's sitting on your bedside table, silly."

Lily grabbed the plate and shoved one piece of toast in her mouth as she rushed out of the dormitory, all her books and supplies in her book bag which was hanging over her left shoulder.

"James Potter was looking for you earlier this morning at breakfast," Emm said rather loudly as she followed.

She almost tripped and fell down the staircase but barely stopped herself. "What did you say?" she asked after dropping the bit of toast sticking out of her mouth into her hand.

"Potter's looking for you."

"I don't care," she resolved before eating the rest of the piece of toast and turning back toward the portrait hole. Once on the proper floor, she noticed the fact that there were very few people left there. She was glad of that, because that way she didn't feel any embarrassment in running across the room.

As the two left the common room and emerged into the corridor, a voice called out to them, telling them to stop. It came from inside the common room, and Lily recognized it as exactly the person she didn't want to see. "Evans! Stop! Evans, Vance! Please!" yelled James Potter.

In frustration, she slammed the portrait behind her, right in his face, and broke into a run again. Emm was running just to keep up. And James came after them, easily gaining on them with his strength from being a Quidditch Chaser.

They were almost there. Just around the next bend… and there would be the Transfiguration classroom, where McGonagall and the other students were waiting.

When she slowed down to turn the last corner, a hand grasped her wrist and pulled her to an abrupt stop. The next thing she knew, James had pushed her up against the wall and had crushed his lips to hers.

Her eyes were wide in shock.

Emm was nowhere to be seen.

His body pressed hers to the cold stone.

She couldn't think.

One hand ran through her hair.

Her mind was blank.

His other still gripped her limp wrist.

Nothing made sense.

His hips grinded against her own.

Her legs were locked from the shock. If he were to pull away, she would fall over.

The bell chimed. They were late to class—even though it was so close.

Finally, James pulled his lips away from hers and took a step back, letting completely go of her. And she collapsed on the ground, dazed and almost scared.

He knelt down beside her to check her health. "Er, Evans, are you all right?" he asked in concern.

She just looked up at him, a deep blush rising to her cheeks, unable to issue a single word. Until, eventually, she said, "W-why?"

He hesitated for a short moment and then replied, "You wouldn't listen to me. I didn't think. And then I just sort of got maybe a bit carried away. I'm sorry." He looked at her expectantly, but, when she didn't respond, he said, "Can I talk now?"

Lily just nodded.

"I, er, I just wanted to know if you liked my poem," he said, nervously ruffling his hair.

As she slowly regained her composure, she stood up and leaned against the wall, slowly articulating the words, "I don't know which one you wrote."

"It was… er, the last one, the one right before the bell rang."

Her eyes went wide again. "You wrote _that_ one?!"

"Was it that horrible?" he moaned, avoiding her eyes.

"No, it was beautiful!" she exclaimed.

James looked up at her surprised. "It was? But it was so stupid."

She laughed. "It wasn't stupid. I liked it."

"You did?"

"It was my favorite."

He closed his eyes. "It was true, you know."

"It seemed that way."

"I meant it completely."

"I could tell."

"I mean, I was talking about you in it."

"Well, I understand that now."

"You really liked it?" he asked hopefully, opening his eyes again and looking at her carefully to make sure she was telling the truth in her response.

"I _loved_ it."

When McGonagall checked outside her door for her missing students, one of which had never before been late to class, she found them up against the stone wall for a second time that morning, lips locked and hands wandering.


End file.
